


between sweet and salt water

by zauberer_sirin



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Angst, Beaches, Daisy feels, F/M, First Time, Future Fic, Healing, Post-Hive, Summer Vacation, working stuff through sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-18
Updated: 2016-05-18
Packaged: 2018-06-09 03:40:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,624
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6888469
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zauberer_sirin/pseuds/zauberer_sirin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Daisy takes some time. Until Coulson shows up.</p>
<p>(written before the s3 finale, probably jossed now)</p>
            </blockquote>





	between sweet and salt water

**one**

“It wasn’t easy, getting here,” he says, grateful for his sunglasses, not looking at her face directly yet, not knowing what seeing her after all this time might do to him. “I had to leave Lola at the bottom of the hill.”

She looks up from her towel.

She doesn’t ask what he’s doing here.

Daisy doesn’t make mistakes, and if she hadn’t wanted to be found Coulson wouldn’t be here. She doesn’t slip. 

He sits by her side, too dressed for the beach. Even the empty, solitary beach.

Daisy wearing a t-shirt over her bikini, it’s getting late (Coulson took longer than he had planned to get here, hesitating all the way, wondering if this was what Daisy wanted him to do) and the light is fading fast. 

But they stay like that for a while, awkwardly sitting side by side.

 

**two**

He has to climb the hill from the beach, going slower than he wants to, with Daisy keeping an eye on his leg. He no longer needs a cane, but it has been a couple of really crappy months of therapy (he’s almost glad Daisy wasn’t around), and he still has the traces.

It’s night by the time they arrive at her bungalow. It’s small and bare and it’s messy - Daisy has clothes all over the place, and books and computers parts Coulson can’t identify. It feels like solitude undisturbed.

“You’ve been here the whole time?” he asks.

“More or less,” she answers. California, sun, isolation. Coulson is not sure he would have called this. She seems not to want to talk about it. “Here, I’ll show you to the guest room, you must be tired.”

There’s something stiff in her choice of words. They haven’t seen each other since the funeral. 

He locks the door behind him, suddenly shy, being around her in a strange house. Daisy was right, he is tired. He folds his clothes neatly over a chair and wonders how long he’ll stay - how long Daisy would want him or even tolerate him here. After months without seeing her it seems like any number of days he can come up with won’t be enough.

He hears the shower starting. Daisy probably wants to wash away the salt and the sand after the whole day out. The noise of the water falling next door lulls him to sleep.

 

**three**

In the morning they go to the beach. The sun is so golden it hurts, actually hurts, Coulson’s eyes and he realizes how long he has been trapped inside the Playground.

“Are you going to be okay with that leg?” Daisy asks him, softly, but there’s challenge in it, she gestures towards the ocean, and Coulson likes the humor in it.

“Don’t worry about my leg,” he replies. “We can race if you want me to prove it.”

She probably knows that he won’t completely stop slightly limping, ever, but she seems to be satisfied with his answer.

He does pretty good in the water, but Daisy still beats him - she has all sorts of muscles he doesn’t, and she’s been here all summer, swimming every day. By the time they get back to the sand he’s panting and she’s mocking him and it’s like the old Daisy is back, like what happened three months ago was some bad dream he can’t quite remember.

He sits on his towel and looks around.

“Pretty quiet spot,” he says. He hasn’t seen anyone else all morning.

“It is secluded,” Daisy says, sounding obviously pleased about it. “Almost feels like a private beach.”

He wonders if that’s why Daisy picked this very spot. To be alone. He feels a bit guilty about interrupting that.

“It’s better, the silence here,” she tells him after they have gone swimming for a while. Coulson feels itchy, keeps digging his toes into the sand, realizing he hasn’t been exposed to sun and salt water in a long time (the last time was a fake, his body wasn’t touched). “It’s worse too, the silence.”

“How come?”

He notices she’s been burying her toes in the sand as well, mirroring him.

“Sometimes it’s so calm out here. I can hear my own thoughts. And it makes me wonder… are they really my own? Or are they… his? It takes me a bit to remember that he’s gone and yes, they are my own. I’m alone.”

The way she talks…

Coulson knows he’s made the trip in vain, she’s not coming back. 

 

**four**

She cooks, saying she wouldn’t let him do that for him, that he’s a guest. But Coulson suspects she just doesn’t want to let him _do that for her_. She makes fresh pasta salad, something quick. Looking around Coulson can tell her diet is not precisely great. She looks thin, but not as thin as she looked when she left them.

She asks about the team, which he takes as a good signal. But she doesn’t hold his gaze when Coulson replies. He tries to make it sound light. And it’s not hard; one difficult truth of life is that… people go on. Even after losing someone.

“Mack is really into taking inventory these days. Again,” he tells Daisy. She grins at the mention. “Agent Rodriguez is shadowing me, for some reason - she’s very ambitious, I think she’s gunning for my job.”

Daisy chuckles. “And she’ll get it, too.”

“Of that I have no doubt,” he says and because they’re on the couch and relaxed and laughing he can’t help but add: “They miss you. We miss you.”

“I know,” Daisy says, looking upset.

She acts icy for the rest of the day.

After dinner Coulson follows her into the kitchen and after she leaves the dishes in the sink Coulson wraps one hand gently over her hip and presses his mouth against hers. He’s not sure what he’s trying to accomplish with this.

When he pulls back Daisy stares at him, the corner of her lips turned up.

“You really are desperate to bring me home, aren’t you?” she says.

“I am,” he admits. He’s about to apologize when Daisy stops him with one light hand over his chest, over his heart.

“Go to bed, Phil,” she says, sounding older than Coulson has ever felt himself.

 

**five**

He goes to bed but he can’t sleep. He stays up, which is why he can’t miss when, hours later, there’s a knock on the door. Daisy doesn’t wait for him to answer and slips into the room.

“Daisy?” he can’t see her face but she’s the only person out here with him.

Coulson about to stand up but, like in the kitchen, Daisy catches him midway and presses one hand against his shoulder, pushing him back to sit on the bed.

He’s about to ask something when he feels - it’s complete darkness - Daisy kissing him.

“This doesn’t mean I’m coming home with you, “ she tells him, between kisses. She’s breathless, and Coulson can’t tell exactly why.

“I know,” he says, but deep down he doesn’t, deep down he hopes. He can’t stop hoping. He never did.

He lifts his hands to her body, and discovers she’s only wearing a t-shirt, nothing else, she obviously came prepared. He can’t see a thing up here - no city lights behind the window. He kisses in the blind and notices the curve of a smile against him when he says Daisy’s name.

“Lie down,” she tells him.

He feels her hands undoing the laces on his pajama pants, her knuckles brushing his bare stomach.

“Daisy.”

“Shh.”

She pushes him back against the pillow, climbing and straddling his lap, making everything happen too fast, and _too_ much. She fucks herself on his cock, while Coulson tries to lie very still, sensing she doesn’t want him to disturb her process.

When it’s over she kisses his shoulder, “I’m sorry, I can’t stay,” she says, and she leaves the room.

 

**six**

They spend the next day curled into each other, not leaving the bungalow, and it feels like Daisy is trying to quench some thirst but like drinking saltwater it’s never really satisfied. They move from the kitchen to the couch to her bedroom, they don’t stop touching for a moment. He still feels uneasy about the way Daisy left his room last night, but he pushes it down, because she looks like she needs him so much.

“I was happy,” she says, when they are resting. Coulson doesn’t remember leaving the bedroom for hours, though he knows that can’t be true. “When that thing was controlling me. I was happy.”

“And now you’re not,” Coulson says, stroking her between her shoulders.

“I can never be _that_ happy, that complete, again. In my life. Knowing that… I don’t know how to go on, knowing that.”

He can’t say anything to that - nothing that isn’t lies, or cliches. So he doesn’t even try. He doesn’t think Daisy would want him to. He drops his head and tries to press the softest kiss he can think of against her back.

She turns on her side when she notices, sliding her thumb under Coulson’s chin.

“You’re very sweet,” she says.

Coulson scoffs. “Yeah, that’s me, I’m known for my sweetness.”

She rests her head on the crook of his elbow, looking up at him, stretching her body across the whole bed. Coulson notices the afternoon is slipping away from them.

“Well, I think so,” she tells him. “I always thought you were sweet.”

He wants to ask what that means - and other things she _always_ thought about, about him. But Daisy kisses him and the first moment of the evening starts.

 

**seven**

They go surfing the next day, taking turns using her board.

It’s a bit of a disaster; he does well enough with swimming but between the lack of practice and his bad leg Coulson ends up spending more time getting knocked off the board than actually surfing.

“I’m sorry,” he tells her when he has to go back to the sand. “I guess there’s no use pretend I’m not exactly _that old_.”

Daisy smiles at him - is she humoring him? - and kneels, rubbing his leg between her hands.

“You’re all right,” she says.

“Daisy.”

“Coulson.” She sounds like she knows what he’s going to say. “ _Please_ don’t ruin this.”

Drops of water slide down the line of her jaw.

“I won’t,” he promises. He doesn’t know what _this_ is, but he’s not going to ruin it for her.

 

**eight**

That night she stays in the guest room after having sex and Coulson realizes she hadn’t been turning away from him, she hadn’t wanted to leave the previous two nights. 

She just didn’t want him to know about the nightmares.

“It wasn’t your fault,” he tells her in the darkness, stroking the back of her head. There’s always a faint smell of sea under the soapy scent after she showers.

“I know that.” she says, letting Coulson scoop her in his arms the best he can, until she can fold herself under his chin. “I know that, but it doesn’t change anything.”

“I know,” Coulson says.

He hates than in this darkness he can’t see her face, and he hates that he’s relieved he can’t.

He hears her wipe her face. He tries to help, drawing the back of his hand across her cheek.

“I told you you were sweet,” she sighs.

 

**nine**

“Lincoln wanted me to leave with him, go see the world,” she says. She tells him, unprompted. He knows it’s none of his business but he wonders if Daisy thinks he’s a horrible person for not asking about this before, for assuming.

“What happened?” he asks.

“He wanted things from me, things I couldn’t give him,” she replies quietly, as if she feels guilty for it. “But when everything was over I was empty.”

She puts her hands between them on the couch, palms upwards, as if she’s making her point.

Coulson looks at them, her empty hands. But Daisy keeps talking.

“You never wanted anything from me. That’s why it was so easy to love you. Because I never felt you were draining me of myself,” she says. “And I don’t want anything from you, either.”

Coulson takes her empty hands in his, entwining their fingers together. It’s not much, he knows. But Daisy keeps their fingers laced as she leads him back to bed.

 

**ten**

It rains the next day, temperamental end-of-the-summer weather, so they have to stay inside.

The place has cable - “I wouldn’t have survived otherwise”, Daisy jokes, casually bumping her shoulder against his in the hallway and Coulson wishes it would rain every day for the rest of their lives - so they have their pick of entertainment, and they end up watching movies all day, drinking instant coffee and poking fun at the contrived plots of 1970s thrillers starring Donald Sutherland.

Daisy has her feet up across his thighs and Coulson is stroking her ankle distractedly as they watch the movie.

“I’m going back tomorrow,” he says, staring at the tv screen. “I can’t stay longer.”

“I know,” Daisy says. “You’re the Director of SHIELD.”

It’s not often that Coulson feels like being selfish or greedy, but for a moment -

“I wish-”

“It’s okay,” Daisy cuts him off. “I’ll be fine out here.”

That’s not the answer he was looking for, but Daisy slides down the couch and suddenly she is cuddled between his arms and Coulson forgets about tomorrow, thinks this is enough.

 

**eleven**

It goes back to sunshine the next day, with a clear sky, no cloud, perfect blue. It sort of annoys Coulson.

“I know what you’re going to ask,” Daisy tells him when they arrive at his car.

“I can’t _not_ ask,” he confesses, shrugging and hoping Daisy will forgive him for it.

She turns around, sitting on Lola’s hood for a moment.

“I know,” she says.

“Daisy…” he starts.

What can he say?

Daisy waves him away.

“I’ll tell you what? Leave Lola with me, and when I’m ready she’ll take me home.”

She said _when_ she’s ready. It’s like a light is switched on inside of him.

“That’s fine,” he tells her, wrapping his hands around her waist for a moment. “Lola will take care of you.”

Daisy leans forward and kisses him. He doesn’t think she has kissed him this gently in all these days together. She doesn’t taste like greed and need anymore. But she still tastes of salt and wind and sun and Coulson still loves how she tastes.

“I lied,” she says, pulling back and searching his eyes. Coulson fixes her a curious look. “When I said I didn’t want anything from you. I said that so you wouldn’t think…”

“I know.”

“But I want things. I want…”

She trails off, biting her bottom lip. He sees her frame tremble a bit, like the night of the nightmares, and he hugs her before she can cry. She doesn’t. She doesn’t cry. Coulson marks it down as a victory. He could never stand to see her cry.

“It’s okay,” he says, threading his fingers through her hair. With difficulty. It’s full of sea.

“Come on,” she says, after several moments of breathing against his neck. “I’ll drive you to the bus station.”

“You don’t have to, I can call a cab,” he says, feeling more like himself now, more relaxed, knowing this is not the last time he’s going to see Daisy is god knows how many months.

She rolls her eyes, “Oh don’t be an idiot,” she says, walking around to get into the driver’s seat.

Coulson smiles, narrowing his eyes at her.

“You’re very sweet, too.”

They drive off as the sun reaches its highest point.


End file.
